Snowboarding is a fastest growing sport since 1997 and has become a winter sport in the United States and other countries. It is usually done on commercially operated slopes which are designed to accommodate many skiers and snowboarders. Snowboarding is similar to skiing, but inspired by surfing and skateboarding. Market research statistics during the period 1990-2004 has shown that the overall snowboarding population increased by 294 percent during this period (i.e., an average increase of 20 percent per year). Another statistics for this period (2004-2005) shows that 6.6 million tickets were sold to snowboarders. These statistics reveal vast growth and popularity of the snowboarding sport on the younger generations.
Snowboarding is a sport that involves descending a snow-covered slope on a single board, a “snowboard”, attached to a user's feet using special boots held within a snowboard-mounted binding. A snowboarder uses a boot designed especially for the requirements of snowboarding. As with skiing, snowboarding requires that boots be secured to a snowboard by boot bindings.
Snowboarding generally involves the use of chair lifts to carry snowboarders from a base to a summit. At each lift there will be a line of skiers and snowboarders waiting to board the chairlift. Snowboarders experience a burden while shuffling over to the chairlift on foot because one foot (the lead foot) remains tied to the snowboard, while the other foot (rear trailing foot) is used to push the user via the snowboard over to the chairlift (similar to how a skateboarder moves himself on a skateboard). Moving by foot on a snowboard can be very tiring, painful and unattractive given the users' odd attachment by a single foot to their snowboards.
The snowboarding differs significantly from skiing. In snowboarding, rather than having separate skis for each foot and poles for each hand, both feet of a snowboarder are held, one in front of the other (or side by side with shoulder width separation), on a single, relatively wide board using a binding system including two boot bindings fixed to the top surface of the snowboard. The primary purpose of the binding system for snowboards is to hold both of the user's boots onto the snowboard during use on ski slopes. Besides that, the binding system must provide adaptability to various shoe sizes and adjustability of the angle of the boots to the longitudinal axis of the snowboard.
The general construction of a snowboard involves three basic components. They are namely the core, base, top surface and edge. A core is typically interior construction of the snowboard. The base is typically the bottom of a board that makes contact with the snow. The edge can be a strip of metal, tuned normally to just less than 90° that runs the length of either side of the board. The top surface is where the binding system is mounted and is the area that directly supports a snowboarder.
The snowboard can be a thin, hourglass shaped board that can be ridden down a ski run. Snowboards generally have a length between 140-165 cm and a width from about 24 up to 27 cm or more. The size variants are meant to accommodate many varieties of people, skill levels, snow types and riding styles. The snowboards are usually constructed with a laminated wood core sandwiched between multiple layers of fiberglass. The bottom or ‘base’ of the snowboard can be generally made of various materials including plastic or coated wood, and can be surrounded by a thin strip of steel as the ‘edge’. The top surface layer can include printed graphics and can be coated with an acrylic. Bindings are separate components from the snowboard top surface (e.g., or “deck”) though they are a very important part of the total snowboard interface. The main function of the binding is to hold the riders boot in place tightly so the rider can transfer their energy to the board.
A chairlift is a type of aerial lift, which comprises of a continuously circulating steel cable loop strung between two end terminals and usually over intermediate towers, carrying a series of chairs. Chair-lift is an on hill transport generally used to travel across various posts.
Passengers moving towards for boarding or traveling on a chair lift need to take necessary precautions to avoid injuries. When the passengers are in a stance position and shuffling towards a chair lift for a ride, they need to adjust the bindings accordingly to alleviate pain in ankles and knees. Snowboards can generally provide up to 45° rotation between the toe areas of each of the bindings that are mounted on a snowboard. The binding positions generally remain fixed once set. The binding position associated in such snowboards can be painful and uncomfortable while a snowboarder is moving along in lift lines and while riding on a chair lift. The stance of the user may look awkward and unnatural. Ideally, binding adjustment should be enabled when the snowboarder is in stance position shuffling over to a chair lift or while riding on a chairlift in order to alleviate pain in the snowboarder's knee and the ankle of the leg that a snowboard can remain tethered to while the snowboarder is dealing with chairlift usage.
The present inventor has created a snowboard binding that can be rotated and that is hinged in order to alleviate pain experienced in a user's leg as it remains tethered to the snowboard during chairlift approach or while standing in chairlift lines, and from dangling snowboards from a user's leg while the user is riding a chairlift. The majority of prior art binding systems do not focus on managing the impact of chairlift wind and the snowboard load on user's foot. The lack of a hands free locking and release system limits the capability of prior art snowboards. There is currently no rotatable binding system for the snowboards which can ease the load on user's foot while shuffling along in chairlift lines as well as when riding on a chairlift. Consequently the snowboard load causes stress on knee and ankle and causes an awkward stance by snowboarders while they move along through lift lines. Similarly the binding position while in lift lines and on the chair lift associated with such systems is painful and its pulling force while tethered by a binding to the user is unnatural for lead ankle. The cascading effect typically results in a binding position which is painful and cumbersome for users while in lift lines and on the chair lift.
Furthermore, if two users are sitting next to each other on a chairlift, and they use opposite boots as their front boot, the twisting of their legs due to their respective bindings can cause their snowboards to collide with each other. This is not only painful, but may also be potentially dangerous. Similarly getting off a chair lift can also be troublesome because the angle at which the user's front boot is bound to the snowboard can make it difficult for the user to position the snowboard in line with forward movement of the chair lift to the point of dismount from the chairlift by the snowboarder. If the snowboard is not positioned in a forward direction with movement of the chair lift as the snowboard touches the ground, the user can veer off to one side and run into the person next to the disembarking snowboarder who had been sharing the chair lift. Hence, an improved snowboard binding system is needed in order to provide greater safety and comfort for snowboarders while in lift lines and on the chair lift.
Based on the foregoing it is believed that a need therefore exists for an improved snowboard binding system that eliminates rotation at the knee and flexion at the ankle which is incorporated with a hands free locking system. It is also believed a need exists for the snowboard binding system to reduce discomfort and injury when loading and unloading from chairlift.